Yesterday, the Primorsky Regional Court handed down a verdict in the case of a gang whose members were found guilty of five murders. The leader of the gang, Vladimir Golban (Moldavan), was sentenced to life imprisonment, his five accomplices were sentenced to various terms of imprisonment, from 10 years to 21 years. The group leader's lawyer has already announced his intention to appeal the court's decision.

Vladimir Golban received an eternal sentence
PHOTO BY MARINA SKLYAROVA, KP-Vladivostok

Yesterday, Judge Alexander Troeglazov, presiding over the trial of the Moldovan gang, which participated in five murders (see below), announced the verdict. Let us remind you that on February 17, the jury returned a verdict, finding all the defendants guilty of certain crimes committed by the group. According to the verdict, Vladimir Golban will serve life imprisonment in a special regime correctional colony. Sergei Yakel was sentenced to 21 years in prison, of which he will spend the first 5 years in prison. Ivan Migalatiev will have to spend 19 years in a maximum security penal colony, Rustam Popov - 14, Alexey Kudinov - 11, and Sergei Kutepov - 10 years.
Thus, the court satisfied the request of the state prosecution to sentence Moldavan to life imprisonment. For the remaining defendants, the prosecutor's office requested a slightly more severe punishment. The judge, apparently, also took into account the fact that Rustam Popov, who took part in all five murders, turned himself in and actively cooperated with the investigation (for him, the state prosecution asked for 15 years in prison).
“The verdict is completely unfair, and we will appeal it to the Supreme Court,” Vladimir Golban’s lawyer Leonid Melnik told Kommersant. According to the lawyer, the indictment was based “solely on Popov’s testimony.” “But he didn’t come to the police and repent on his own. After he was arrested, he spent three months in custody and remained stubbornly silent. But then, as it turned out at the trial, so-called spies were put in his cell, and he consulted with them on how to behave. They advised him: choose a person from whom you can make an organizer, and choose the role of a performer for yourself,” said Mr. Melnik.
According to his version, in reality, Rustam Popov was a “roof” for Vladimir Golban, “his dad is a police colonel, and he resolved all issues with inspectors in the park.” “When Golban asked for water at the trial, Popov said: “Give him a lollipop, let him suck it.” That is, a person who, according to investigators, is terribly afraid of Golban, behaves as follows. This only shows that he absolutely doesn’t give a damn about this Golban, for him he is not an authority,” lawyer Leonid Melnik stated his point of view. In his opinion, the prosecutor’s office “put together a gang so that they would have someone to hang the corpses on.”
“For example, I am Ukrainian by nationality, and behind my back they can call me Khokhol, I will go to the bathhouse with my friends, after that one of my friends will commit some particularly serious crime, he will call me the organizer, and no matter how much I then made excuses, it will be useless,” the lawyer said. Nevertheless, he expressed satisfaction that during the judicial investigation “it was possible to prove that Popov is lying.” “He testified that Golban instructed Kutepov to kill Akhapkin, and the jury decided that Kutepov could not shoot. Now the presiding judge says that an unidentified person fired the shot, and Popov was present. It was important for us to cast doubt on Popov’s testimony, and we did,” concluded Vladimir Golban’s lawyer.
ALEXEY CHERNYSHEV, Vladivostok
What was Vladimir Golban’s gang charged with?
As the investigation established, the commercial director of the Vladivostok Central Park of Culture and Recreation “Minny Gorodok” Vladimir Golban, known in criminal circles as Moldavan, created a gang in 1999. His group included seven people (Konstantin Korshunov and Evgeny Kovalev, who, by the way, are charged with the murder of the governor of the Magadan region Valentin Tsvetkov, are wanted). The first thing the OPS did was to eliminate the security guard of the “authoritative” businessman Trifonov in 2000. According to investigators, Moldavan tried to take control of the passenger road transport market in Vladivostok and eliminated competitors. And since Mr. Trifonov owned a bus company, the investigation regarded the murder of his security guard as an attempt to intimidate the businessman. According to the prosecution, the murder of Tatyana Safronova, head of the transport department of the Vladivostok administration, in 2001 (this episode was separated into a separate proceeding) was also connected with control over the passenger road transportation market. In 2002, the general director of the Vladivostok company Rigils, Vladimir Chentsov, who was also involved in passenger road transportation, became a victim of Moldavian bandits.
People were killed not only because of commercial disagreements, but also because of the personal problems of the gang leader. In 2000, in the city of Spassk-Dalniy, the ex-husband of Vladimir Golban’s cohabitant, Vladimir Dikun, was killed, who did not want to give the apartment to his ex-wife. And in 2002, in Irkutsk, bandits shot and killed businessman Vanik Harutyunyan, who was delaying the return of a debt to Moldavian. The group also accepted orders from outside. Thus, the jury found it proven that in 2002 its participants shot and killed the general director of the Primorye information and analytical agency, Sergei Akhapkin, who previously headed the committee on architecture and capital construction of the Primorye administration. The person who ordered this murder has not been identified. All members of the gang, in addition to murders, were charged with banditry and illegal transactions with weapons and explosives.

Kommersant (Khabarovsk) No. 38 from 03/04/2006

Moldovans will not see a century of freedom